subject: Winning with Your Team I [print this page] Winning with Your Team I Winning with Your Team I
"She may have to go." Tough words that no one really likes to hear
I was recently speaking to a client about his office manager. He was worried and now disappointed with her performance even though she has been a successful member of his team for many years.
How could this be?
Often a dentist will have situations like this with personnel. In fact, personnel are a continuing challenge. Because they are a continuing challenge, you must be continually taking on the role of managing them.
It is only a matter of time until you will have to replace even you best staff members. It is all part of the life cycle of your practice. No matter how much you want it to be otherwise, personnel changes are inevitable. Staff move, leave for school, go to other offices from some perception of improving circumstances. They retire. They move on to other opportunities. Some have changes in personal circumstances and families. Some are dismissed for poor performance or poor attitude. Some leave over differences of values, environment, atmosphere, intra-team squabbling.
The point is that personnel change. It is how you prepare for these changes that is critical to your success. People coming in and going out are part of the life cycle of a practice.
Not that you want them to. We treasure our high performing, service oriented team. It is far easier not to have to bring new people in, right? It can be a pain to recruit new people that will successfully hold the positions. It can be a real crapshoot sometimes. Plus, candidates are trained to perform well at their auditions (job interviews) which can make finding the right person that much more of a challenge. Haven't you found that to be true?
Still here is the most common problem with your team members: they get too little of your direction and attention. Gee, I am sure you like hearing that. Nevertheless, one of the easiest ways to increase your productivity is get everyone on board with you. Virtually all dentists can get a lot of increased leverage out of changing how they operate with their team. Moreover, it doesn't cost more dollars to do so. It does take your time and a system and adhering to it.
Now that I have opened up this subject, I will give you some suggestions on how to improve your system and how you operate with your team.
I have found no practice (or business of any kind for that matter) can successfully grow without team stability. That stability becomes a platform for expansion. That stability allows you to move forward, to go beyond the very basics of operations. In our increasingly sophisticated world, your best patients expect that stability and attention to the details. This is very hard to do with a constantly shifting staff. So just how important is this? Successful growing practices have team stability. The ones that have trouble are those who have consistent team turnover.
Having a good team is part of the quintessential equation of practice success. You can't be everywhere at once. You need a good team.
I applaud all dentists who have long term high performing team members. I also applaud the team members themselves. Team longevity says something about whom they are and who you are. You are doing something very right to have this. But long term is becoming infrequent for our society. What was once the standard take a job and stay there for decades is now an anomaly. Nationally, three years is the average! That doesn't sound very good, does it?
So, what can you do to manage personnel? That question is not a small one. That question breeds many, many questions. Just as asking the question, "How do I market to get more new patients," requires a multiplicity of answers, so too does the personnel question.
If you are having trouble with getting and retaining quality staff, the good news is that this series on personnel can be very helpful. The bigger challenge is for you to become the manager and leader that long term staffs like having. I believe we are all in the process of becoming. If you have consistent personnel problems then learning a new way, a different way of operating with your people just could be the next step for your practice growth, wouldn't you agree?
If you are a dentist that does not have personnel as an issue, then the words here can help you prepare for your future problems. Plus, you are not in any rush. You have breathing room. Wouldn't it make good sense to prepare for personnel changes that will come in the future by preparing for it now?
Your people must grow and adapt, become more proficient, more productive just as you must for your practice to grow and succeed, right? How are you guiding them so they can?
Obviously, a practice can't grow beyond the self-development of its leader.
It is also true that staff need to grow too. This isn't big news to most of them. Most want to grow. Some will leave you if you fail to provide that growth environment. A real problem can develop when a staff member believes she is "done," not needing more. The same is true for the Dr.
If the Dr stops growing, it is very difficult to move forward. Thus, you have very good reason to continue with this program as it was developed to do just that help you grow in the ways that make the given strategies and tools operational within your practice, help you have the practice you have always wanted.
Growing the staff is also the reason that the staff video segments have been introduced recently. Don't you think it would be a good idea to use this resource?
One last point for now: it is important to decide to improve your personnel situation and prepare for an inevitable future, right?
Back to the question posed by a client on what to do with his office manager. I asked him a question that stopped him in his tracks. He had not thought of that before. What was this and how does it apply to you? We'll cover that next time.
